This issue can be closed when we have completed the following steps (in order).
Please ensure all artifacts (PRs, workflow runs, Tweets, etc) are linked from
this issue for posterity. Refer to this prior release issue for
examples of each step, assuming release vX.Y.0 is being cut.

Code Freeze

• [In Crossplane Runtime]: Prepared the release branch release-X.Y:
  • Confirm that all security/critical dependency update PRs from Renovate are merged into master
    • https://github.com/crossplane/crossplane-runtime/pulls?q=is%3Apr+is%3Aopen+label%3Aautomated
  • Created the release branch using the GitHub UI.
  • (On the Master Branch) Created and merged an empty commit with git commit --allow-empty -s -m "Empty commit after release-X.Y": Empty commit after release-1.17 crossplane-runtime#759
  • (On the Master Branch) Run the Tag workflow with the release candidate tag for the next release vX.Y+1.0-rc.0. Message suggested, but not required: Release candidate vX.Y+1.0-rc.0..
  • (On the Release Branch) Run the Tag workflow with the release candidate tag for the next release vX.Y.0-rc.1 (assuming the latest rc tag for vX.Y.0 is vX.Y.0-rc.0). Message suggested, but not required: Release candidate vX.Y.0-rc.1..
• [In Core Crossplane]: Prepared the release branch release-X.Y:
  • Confirm that all security/critical dependency update PRs from Renovate are merged into master
    • https://github.com/crossplane/crossplane/pulls?q=is%3Apr+is%3Aopen+label%3Aautomated
  • Created the release branch using the GitHub UI.
  • (On the Master Branch) created and merged a PR bumping the Crossplane Runtime dependency to the release candidate tag from master, vX.Y+1.0-rc.0.
  • (On the Release Branch) created and merged a PR bumping the Crossplane Runtime dependency to the release candidate tag on the release branch, vX.Y.0-rc.1.
  • (On the Master Branch) Run the Tag workflow with the release candidate tag for the next release, vX.Y+1.0-rc.0. Message suggested, but not required: Release candidate vX.Y+1.0-rc.0..
  • (On the Master Branch) created and merged a PR to add the new release branch to the baseBranches list in .github/renovate.json5.
• [In Core Crossplane]: Cut a Crossplane release candidate from the release branch release-X.Y:
  • (On the Release Branch) Run the Tag workflow with the release candidate tag for the release vX.Y.0-rc.1 (assuming the latest rc tag for vX.Y.0 is vX.Y.0-rc.0). Message suggested but not required: Release candidate vX.Y.0-rc.1..
  • (On the Release Branch) Run the CI workflow and verified that the tagged build version exists on the releases.crossplane.io build channel, e.g. build/release-X.Y/vX.Y.0-rc.1/... should contain all the relevant binaries.
  • (On the Release Branch) Run the Promote workflow with channel stable, ticking the box for This is a pre-release and verify:
    • The tagged build version exists on the releases.crossplane.io stable channel at stable/vX.Y.0-rc.1/....
    • The tagged build is NOT marked as "current" in stable/current/version.
    • Ensured that the release candidate is visible on the stable helm repo with: helm repo add crossplane-stable https://charts.crossplane.io/stable --force-update && helm search repo crossplane-stable --devel.
  • Published a new release for the tagged version as pre-release, with the same name as the version, taking care of generating the changes list selecting as "Previous tag" vX.<Y-1>.0, so the first of the releases for the previous minor.
    • Select the Set as a pre-release and Create a discussion for this release checkboxes.
    • Do NOT select the Set as the latest release checkbox.
  • Ensured that users have been notified about the release candidate on the #announcement channel of the Crossplane's Slack workspace.

Release

• Opened a docs release issue
• Checked that the GitHub milestone for this release only contains closed issues.
• Cut a Crossplane Runtime version and consume it from Crossplane.
  • [In Crossplane Runtime]: Run the Tag workflow on the release-X.Y branch with the proper release version, vX.Y.0. Message suggested, but not required: Release vX.Y.0.
  • Published a new release for the tagged version, with the same name as the version, taking care of generating the changes list selecting as "Previous tag" vX.<Y-1>.0, so the first of the releases for the previous minor.
  • [In Core Crossplane]: (On the Release Branch) Update the Crossplane Runtime dependency to vX.Y.0.
• (On the Release Branch) Run the Tag workflow with the proper release version, vX.Y.0. Message suggested, but not required: Release vX.Y.0.
• (On the Release Branch) Run the CI workflow and verified that the tagged build version exists on the releases.crossplane.io build channel, e.g. build/release-X.Y/vX.Y.0/... should contain all the relevant binaries.
• (On the Release Branch) Run the Promote workflow with channel stable and verified that the tagged build version exists on the releases.crossplane.io stable channel at stable/vX.Y.0/....
• Select a release MVP from the community that had significant impact on the release and include recognition of them in the release notes and blog post.
• Published a new release for the tagged version, with the same name as the version and descriptive release notes
  • generate the changes list by selecting the "Previous tag" as vX.<Y-1>.0, i.e., the first of the releases for the previous minor.
  • Ensure the release MVP is recognized in the release notes.
  • Before publishing the release notes, set them as Draft and ask the rest of the team to double check them.
• Checked that the docs release issue created previously has been completed.
• Updated, in a single PR, the following on master:
  • The releases table in the README.md, removing the now old unsupported release and adding the new one.
  • The baseBranches list in .github/renovate.json5, removing the now old unsupported release.
• Closed the GitHub milestone for this release.
• Request @jbw976 to perform a CloudFront cache invalidation on https://charts.upbound.io/stable/ and https://releases.crossplane.io/stable/
• Publish a blog post about the release to the crossplane blog
  • Ensure the release MVP is recognized in the blog post
  • @jbw976: skipping the blog post this time for now due to resource constraints
• Ensured that users have been notified of the release on all communication channels:
  • Slack: #announcements channel on Crossplane's Slack workspace.
  • Twitter: reach out to a Crossplane maintainer or steering committee member, see OWNERS.md.
  • LinkedIn: same as Twitter
• Request @jbw976 to remove all old docs versions from Google Search
• Remove any extra permissions given to release team members for this release